Storm-related cuts in production often lead to higher prices, but oil and gas made small moves Thursday. Benchmark oil gained 4 cents to close at $97.44 a barrel, while natural gas closed down 7.4 cents to $4.24 per million British thermal units.

Companies including Shell, BP and Anadarko Petroleum pulled hundreds of workers from platforms and shut in production to avoid risks of spills or equipment damage.

Anadarko said it was evacuating about 185 employees and contractors from six production facilities, including the Nansen, Boomvang, Gunnison, Red Hawk and Constitution spars, and the Marco Polo facility. Shell Oil said it evacuated about 195 workers and shut down production from the Perdido Spar.

BP evacuated workers from its Atlantis, Holstein and Mad Dog platforms and was shutting in production at Atlantis. The other two platform were already offline for scheduled maintenance. Apache Corp. said 306 non-essential personnel had been evacuated from its western Gulf facilities, but so far there was no impact on production.

ExxonMobil said it has evacuated an undisclosed number of offshore workers.

On Thursday, Gulf Coast refineries were monitoring the storm. San Antonio-based Valero said it wasn't planning any operational changes at its refineries. Exxon said its Baytown refinery, the largest in the country, "has initiated appropriate preliminary safety procedures for weather-related situations," including planning for additional staff and tying down material that might become airborne in heavy winds.